Five Drown in Port Gardner Storm
An Everett boating party, including a local professor and his family, vanishes after attempting to cross the storm-tossed bay against warnings.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
It seems very probable that an entire party consisting of three men and two women have been drowned by the capsizing of a boat between Everett and Marysville. On Friday afternoon, a sailor named Harry Leary borrowed a small yacht belonging to Superintendent Campbell. It is supposed that he undertook to convey a party consisting of Prof. Ganiard, his wife, a son about 19 years of age, and a Miss Thompson, who wanted to go to Marysville. They were engaged to play at a ball to be given by the Odd Fellows. Leary had asked Campbell for the use of the boat, but the sea was very rough in Port Gardner Bay, and he was warned it would be unsafe. Witnesses reported the party struggling against the boiling waters in the storm. Nothing was seen of them until Sunday morning, when the steamer Mabel discovered the boat capsized. The bodies are presumed washed out to sea, and hope for their survival has been abandoned.
“For twelve or fourteen hours at least they were exposed to the fury of the gale, the wind was bitterly cold, and in such a storm they must have died immediately the boat capsized.”
Port Gardner Bay remains a dangerous, weather-sensitive waterway for small craft, a reality that hasn't changed since 1892. This tragedy echoes the persistent tension between the Pacific Northwest’s rugged maritime environment and our desire to traverse it for work and recreation.
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